Kyabram recorded its wettest 24-hour period for June on Thursday (June 8) when more than 50 millimetres was recorded by the Bureau of Meteorology.
Between 9am on Wednesday and 9am on Thursday there was 53.2mm of rain recorded, bettering the June 23 record (since 1964 at least) of 38.6mm.
Winter in Kyabram has traditionally represented a little over a quarter of the annual expected rainfall in the town.
But, as you would expect across six decades, there are significant extremes at both ends of the scale.
The lowest amount registered in a month at the start of winter (June) is 2.2mm — only six years ago in 2017 — while the heaviest was 109.8mm way back in 1991.
It rained for all but eight days of June that year, including a 23.6mm downpour and a 17.6mm recorded late in the month for a 24-hour period.
This week the forecast was for significant amounts of rainfall and, at least in the north-east of Victoria, those predictions were not far off the mark.
Flood warnings were common place on Thursday morning after more than 100mm of rain was recorded at weather stations including Seven Creeks at Strathbogie, Honeysuckle Creek at Violet Town and 112mm at Whitfield in the King Valley.
To the west of the “storm’s eye”, at Seymour, 61.6mm was recorded and to the east (at Mt Hotham) 81mm was registered. To the north 47.3mm fell at Benalla and in the south 68mm fell at Marysville.
Kyabram has had several years where the rains have not arrived in conjunction with the cold weather.
In 2005 and 2018 there was no rainfall for the first week of winter, before the wet arrived for 10 of the next 11 days. Twelve years before that, in 2006, only one day of rainfall was recorded from the first day of winter (June 1) until the 23nd day of the month when 19.2mm broke the big dry.
June, July and August generally average about 40mm of rain, from the 59 years of registered rainfall between 1964 and 2023.
In recent years a 27.4mm downfall on June 1, 2014 was among a 75.6mm monthly total. In July and August of that year only 34mm of rainfall fell as the precipitation fell away dramatically.
In 2021, 63mm of rainfall fell for the month of June and the winter tally hit 143.2mm (falling away significantly in August when just 26.6mm fell after successive 50mm-plus months).
It was, however, 2016 that saw a winter total of 192.6mm (627mm for the year, compared to Kyabram’s 350mm average).
That was the wettest winter since 2003 (when 192.4mm was recorded). In 1996 there was 220.1mm for the winter period and a similar amount was recorded for the three-month period in 1973.
Twelve years ago, in June 2011, there was just 19.8mm of rainfall recorded.
Last year’s start to winter was significantly drier, just 4.2mm recorded from three days of rainfall from June 1 to 5.
An 11.4mm downfall on June 6 was the heaviest of the month as only 32.6mm fell for the first 30 days of winter.
In July there were 11 days of recorded rainfall, but just one of those was more than 2mm, a 7.8mm downpour late in the month. Only 14.4mm fell for the month.
August produced a significantly improved result, for enthusiasts of rainfall, with 51.2mm arriving in Kyabram from 15 days of rain. The heaviest downpour was 12.6mm on August 23, with three other days of 5mm plus.
In August 2010 a massive 88mm of rainfall was recorded in Kyabram, the second most since the 1964 record keeping process started.
For those who like to talk about the weather the past week has been a virtual goldfield of conversation making.